The bombers used nearly 12,000 weapons on the extremist groups in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, according to an April 12 statement from the Air Force. The B-52 is commonly referred to as "BUFF," or "big ugly fat fellow," and has been in service for 63 years. For the past two, it's been the main bomber of the US Central Command.
"In every war that America finds itself in," Lt. Col. Paul Goossen, commander of the 69th Expeditionary Bomb Squadron, said, "it keeps being reinvented and it keeps showing its usefulness and its relevance."
The B-52 broke a number of records during its past two years of operations. The 23rd Bomb Squadron ran 400 consecutive missions without any maintenance delays, which broke the previous record set during Operation Linebacker II, part of the US war on Vietnam.
The B-52 was used extensively in the coalition's Mosul campaign, in which white phosphorus was also reportedly used in June 2017. According to an AP report, between 9,000 and 11,000 civilians were killed, of which at least 3,200 were killed by coalition forces or their Iraqi partners.
In Afghanistan, B-52 bombs literally resculpted the country. A US Air Forces Central Command spokesman told The Drive that the BUFF was dropping 50-pound ‘dumb bombs' on mountain passes and cover areas, referring to them as "terrain denial strikes."
While the US Air Force says the B-52 has wrapped up operations against extremists in the regions, the respective groups' offensives continue. Over the weekend, four attacks believed to be by the Taliban rocked Afghanistan, killing 24 members of Afghan security forces and resulting in the destruction of two schools.
Meanwhile, in Syria, Daesh has launched at least two offensives since the April 13 American bombardment, in Yarmuk, a suburb in the southern Damascus region, killing 10 members of Hay'at Tahrir Al-Sham, or al-Qaeda in Syria, which controls the town. Daesh reportedly went on the offensive there less than an hour after US President Donald Trump began targeting the government.
In the oil rich region of Deir ez-Zor, Syria Daesh fighters killed over a dozen members of the Syrian Army before the SAA repelled the attack, just days after the US strikes, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.